His purpose clear
by Antaria
Summary: This is a tale of the Angel of the Lord, who rebelled against the Heaven but never Fell. one-shot, cas centric, a brief summary of the character


Let me tell you about a certain Angel of the Lord.

He saw our ancestors walk out of the ocean. He remembers so clearly that day, when he watched the small reptile crawl out of

the swirling waters.

He served for a long time, away from his heavenly home. He watched humans grow. He was there when Lucifer rebelled, angry with their Father who preferred ungrateful humans. He was there when Lucifer was struck down, imprisoned for his pride. He was there, watching in cold obedience, as Michael torn between orders and love for his brother, pierced the rebellious Archangel. In retrospect, the experience should have been demonstrative.

He remembers the day when his captain disobeyed orders. He would not admit it at the time, but he admired Anael. She fell, because she did not wish to participate in the great play that archangels had planned. It took him a long time, but he understood why she left. She was the first and the last angel of the Garrison who found out the whole scheme from the source. Her example was the reason the rest of them never found out until it was too late.

He was part of the strike force sent to Hell to find the Winchester. The whole occasion was suspicious. The timing of the orders, the story about Dean breaking the first seal, how they 'just' found out about it. He felt uneasy, he felt doubts. But he was a soldier, a good soldier. He was strong, and obeying orders without relying on personal judgment was easy.

He could not believe he did it. He, out of hundreds, was the one to pull the Righteous Man out. In itself, the fact that he wasn't trapped instead of the mortal was a miracle. He did not know at the time, it would only be first of a series of miracles that would keep him glued to Winchester brothers.

The mortals confused him. Made him doubt. He admired their determination to do right. He watched Anael, now preferring Anna, as she felt and lived as a fallen, latching onto the broken human. Uriel's betrayal made him fear the changes he felt inside himself. Then he finds out more about the fate prepared for cursed brothers, tries to warn them. He is caught, tied, put back on the 'right' path by his brothers and sisters and, for a moment, everything is returned to its usual, simple black and white, something he could understand. The mortal, Dean, has odd effect on him and he does the unthinkable – betrays the Heaven, goes against all the orders and then burns before the archangel's blade.

He knew he should have been dead. He should have died back in hell, attempting to return Dean to the waking world. He does not believe in coincidences, but he does believe in his Father. Perhaps, the last angel that truly believes. So he moves on searching for him. He sees humans – no, people around him, learns more about them. He gets into trouble on his own and then some more while helping the two brothers. He admires his older brother Gabriel, the way he stood up for the mortals and for the Winchesters. As he sees those two broken men struggle on with their lives, he starts believing in them too.

His faith is tested by Joshua, feeling that his Father has left him. It was his second resurrection that opens his eyes. His Father wanted him to be free, to do what he chooses to do. What he chose was freedom; he chose mortals, admiring them even more. With renewed strength he comes back to his brothers, but they cannot understand the revelation, they keep clinging to peace. He is not sure what was the deciding factor – his naïveté, his new pride or his growing love towards mortals – but he was ready to do anything to stop Raphael from restarting the apocalypse, even if it meant betraying his friends.

He was ashamed for how he pulled Sam out without his soul, but he promised to make up for it. And so he keeps repeating the mantra to himself, that his every action, every deal with Crowley is for the good of the people, for the good of his friends. He hates himself for lying to them. He hates himself for learning new torture tricks from the demon. Every time they call for him, he fears more and more to reveal the truth. He sees confusion in their eyes as he talks about the lost soul; doubt as he keeps pushing; suspicion and fear as he rips the hybrid for information. They are correct and wrong in ways they don't understand. He hears their doubts, not quite understanding how much they mirror his own.

He keeps on fighting with the whole of heaven and at the same time protects his friends. More and more of his brothers and sisters die in his civil war. He can't keep coming back to earth, though it is a welcome escape, reassurance for his actions. The war is difficult – fighting an archangel is impossible, and many are lost simply through speeches Raphael makes, like Rachel. Balthazar, his best friend and brother, was perhaps the last one who did not question his actions (just judge them in the easy manner he judged everything). But his friends kept calling him, expecting him to solve all their problems at any time, even as he is hunted, even as he fights his own brothers, even as he searches for the key. Dean asked him to stop, not understanding that there was no way to stop anymore. He understands now, he should have left the moment they found a way to open the purgatory. He should have come back to his friends when he pulled Sam out, should have explained it to them. His own arrogance and anger blinded him, he understands. He was free for the first time in millennia, and all he did was create more conflict.

He can't go back, not anymore. So he becomes God if only to stop Crowley and Raphael. He fears what Raphael would have done with all those souls. The voices were strong, but in his pride he believed he could hold them in check. He was wrong of course, and what was supposed to be a one shot turns into a delusion of godhood and a massacre of both people and his brothers. He is still disgusted by what he had done; how he himself was taking away the freedom he cherished and was proud of so much. He was so close to killing all his friends, killing the first and oldest in paranoia of betrayal. It was only fair that he died by the claws of the souls he so boldly gulped up from the Purgatory, but he did not wish it to be the Leviathans. He should have brought Balthazar back before they ripped their vessel to shreds.

He is resurrected for the third time, a curse he mistook for a miracle the first times. He shifts to a relatively normal human life Jimmy would have wanted, only to be pulled back by Dean. The returning memories burn though him; ignorance was in fact bliss. It does not take him long to understand the reason for his resurrection, as he shifts away the madness from Sam and onto himself. As his mind crumbles down, reliving almost two centuries of torture in Lucifer's cage, he is truly proud of himself, in the most psychopath way. After all, he argued to the many dead brothers and sisters bleeding and broken before him, his was now a full-scale member of Team Free Will. He caused an apocalypse with good intentions, he died several times, and he attempted to live a normal life, putting the life of his 'normal' family, angels in his case, in danger. As dead pulled at his limbs, peeled his skin, broke his bones, ripped his wings and shattered his mind, he knew it felt good to belong.

Was he surprised when bells and thunder woke him up from ? Hardly. Was he surprised when Winchesters showed up, needing his help and his blood to defeat the next monster? He happily helped, never truly oblivious to the tension that surrounded him. Insanity simply made everything clear, and he honestly preferred it to the endless difficulties of freedom. He understood finally that the only reason for his resurrection were the constant needs of Winchesters, be it transport, Leviathan detection,fresh food or blood. His pride finally popped and with insanity as his moral compass, he was closer to 'human' then ever before. That was why it was sad for him as his mind inevitably restored and he was forced into putting up his act to avoid conflict and himself. By the time he agreed to help in killing the Leviathan he was mostly sane, by human standards. While insane, apologies came easily. With sanity, all of the guilt came back.

Now, he is here, in Purgatory. He hopes that all the angels he killed, including Balthazar, Anna and Rachel, are here. Maybe he can finally die for what he had done to them. That is, of course, after he saves Dean from dying in here. He searches the area, assessing the amount of enemies they had to face, easing into his old familiar black and white soldier routine. As he senses leviathans falling apart, devouring each other and disappearing, he wonders if He planned all of what had happened. Insanity would have to wait. Castiel knew well the reasons for his resurrections, and was not about to fail again, neither his Father nor his friends.


End file.
